E-Libraries and Downloadable Audio Books

For this exercise, I explored Maryland Overdrive because that's our system and I figured I should be familiar with the one our patrons will be using. I've experimented with MD-O before because patrons were asking questions about the downloadable PDF books - whether they could transfer it to their portable mp3 players, whether they could burn the books onto a CD, whether they could print the PDF books out - and I wanted to be able to answer those questions. I find first-hand experience is the best way to know a product, so I went home and downloaded Christopher Moore's The Stupidest Angel as a PDF to my home computer.

At first, I was excited about how easy it was to download the book and how quickly it was delivered, with no needing to go to the library and hunt down the book and take it home. Just click, wait five seconds, and boom, you've got a book on your computer. The problem came when I began trying to read said conveniently-acquired book. I couldn't stand to read it on the screen. I longed for the feel of a thick book in my hands and the sunshine on the back of my neck while I lounged on my back porch with a glass of tea. Not only that, my eyes hurt after a while, and I couldn't keep up with where I was on the screen. It allowed me to print, but who wants to use up all that ink and paper to print out 200+ pages? In the end, I came to the library and checked out the physical book because I couldn't stand to deal with the online version.

Now, I'm not much of an audio book listener. Usually the only time I bother with audio books is when I'm going on a road trip and need something to keep me awake for seven or eight ours at a stretch rolling down the highway. I think that I could get into the idea of checking out audio books, though, perhaps for afternoons when I want to knit and read at the same time, or when I'm working on a project that won't allow me to have a book in my hands. It's certainly easy enough to download, just like the PDF books, it's convenient and simple to use, and you don't have to worry about overdues because the book simply expires off your hard drive. (Digital library collections are probably a very good idea for those patrons who have a hard time returning their materials on time!)

The only thing I don't understand about the eLibraries is the fact that there are only certain numbers of copies available for download. I understand that this is probably a copyright issue, which is fine, but my technological-friendly brain thinks, "Why should I have to put a hold on a digital edition of something? It's a file; it can be downloaded a billion times - that's the joy of digital copies!" If copyright law is the issue here, that makes perfect sense, but it still seems a little counter-intuitive to me to put a hold on digital material that I know should logically be available at all times to as many patrons as are requesting it.

One more thing I'll note for the record is that the Overdrive people are extremely helpful in terms of customer problems. If you have a patron who is having technical issues with downloading materials, Overdrive is very willing to help solve the problem. Great customer service.